Just football, lots of football.

Day -949. WorldCup2018.

You hear but you don't listen. You look but you don't really see.  You pay attention, or so you think, but you don't remember what it was you were supposed to be paying attention to. You follow football around the world but you don't notice that it takes three years to qualify for a World Cup.

It has taken this countdown for me to be really aware that there are countries around the world that started their qualification matches earlier than the official 1000 day countdown was started by the Russia 2018 organising committee. Less than a year after Brazil 2014 ended and more than three years before Russia 2018 starts, the lowest ranked Asian teams started playing. The winners have since moved on to the second round, but none of them will be even close to moving beyond that, let alone be in Russia.

Today Asia had it's first qualifier for the third round. Qatar, while building a team that will not be an embarrassment as hosts in 2022, have won all their matches so far. They move on courtesy of their latest win and China's draw with Hong Kong. There is a story there, the country playing as an independent state against the country that administers it.

Saudi Arabia scored 10 against East Timor. There's another story, when one looks back at the terrible events of 1999 that the country went through to fight against the Indonesian occupation and gain independence in 2002.

Iran beat Guam 6-0 for the second time, putting an end to the Guam fairytale story. And Syria got a 93rd injury time winner to beat Singapore (who had equalised in the 89th minute) to stay 1 point behind Japan in their group. That Syria story, with all it's political implications could go on for a while. And Iraq, a football crazy country who's supporters defy bombings and threats against them, won again to put themselves in a strong position.

South America looks like it's going to be very interesting and extremely close fought. The norm, for most South American qualifying tournaments, is that it is assumed that Brazil and Argentina will qualify (if they didn't automatically as hosts or holders) and the other teams will fight for the other 2 spots, and the 1 play-off place. Not so this time, so far. Argentina won for the first time today, their first win in 4. Brazil are slowly looking better. They beat Peru 3-0 today, but other teams are looking very strong. Ecuador have won 4 out of 4. Chile, the reigning South American champions have already beaten Brazil. Uruguay, convincingly beat Chile today and Colombia are back to being a real threat after their strong showing at Brazil 2014. Venezuela, Bolivia and Peru might be the only weaker teams out of the 10.

Africa is into it's second round of three. Today all the big teams ended any dreams and hopes the smaller countries may have had. Algeria beat Tanzania 7-0, after a surprise 2-2 draw in the first leg; Egypt beat Chad 4-0 to emphatically overcome a 1-0 loss in Chad and Nigeria were less convincing in beating Swaziland.

Of course, in terms of fairytales and dreams, Comoros had captured this neutral's imagination. Fan as I have been of Ghana in recent World Cups, the thought of the Islanders from Comoros pulling off a huge shock was fascinating. It was not meant to be, but it was in no way humiliating. Ghana fought to a 2-0 win, after a 0-0 draw in the first leg. As for Comoros, and maybe this was part of the fascination, the wait for their first ever World Cup win goes on. They'll be back in October 2019 when it starts over again, a new long road, that to Qatar.